“The airlines, railways and emergency responders depend on us to provide immediate, detailed weather information around the clock,” said Hans-Joachim Koppert, head of Weather Forecasting Services at Deutscher Wetterdienst (DWD). “We knew NetApp All Flash FAS could not only handle our exponential data growth, but also speed our weather visualization application so that we could provide life-saving information to first responders in real time.”
As Germany’s national meteorological service, DWD takes in feeds from more than 2,000 measuring stations, a network of 17 weather radar systems, numerous meteorological satellites, and a massive number of international data sources. The data is fed into complex forecast models and accessed through NinJo, DWD’s weather visualization application, and TriVis, a powerful graphics solution for the visualization of meteorological data for all digital media. With advances in radar and satellite technologies, the data collected by DWD has grown exponentially, making it increasingly difficult for the service to deliver the fast response times customers need. The problem was particularly acute for the search-and-rescue pilots who depend on weather forecasts from NinJo to complete their operations safely. Retrieving weather data needed for a search-and-rescue operation could take up to 15 seconds—far too long when a rescuer is dealing with a life or death situation.
Having relied on NetApp® storage for more than 14 years with no unplanned application downtime, DWD was confident that NetApp (NASDAQ: NTAP) All Flash FAS would deliver the performance required to speed its NinJo application. Since implementing NetApp All Flash FAS, DWD can provide emergency responders with real-time access to the information needed to complete their missions and save lives. DWD has also been able to build out innovative features. These features include the ability to trace the path of a plane on a map instantaneously and display three- or four-dimensional weather data for that location in real time. Aviation, shipping and railway customers also can minimize costly weather delays and plan more efficient routes. Faster warnings enable the general public to better prepare for severe weather situations, such as tornadoes and thunderstorms—protecting property and saving lives. With NetApp All Flash FAS, DWD has been able to:
· Calculate weather conditions in real time.
· Improve rescue operations by mapping three- or four-dimensional weather data.
· Accelerate performance of its NinJo application.
· Streamline management for more than 8PB of data and 164 storage systems across 21 sites throughout Germany.
· Improve the accuracy of weather forecasts and warnings.
